Crossing blocked, return impossible (Luke 9:51-62)

[FransJVermeiren]

In my book A Chronological Revision of the Origins of Christianity I work out the theory that the central events described in the Gospels took place just before and during the war of the Jews against the Romans (66-70 CE) and that the Jesus of the Gospels was one and the same person as Jesus son of Saphat in Josephus. This Jesus son of Saphat was one of the most important Galilean leaders of the rebellion, with his home base on the western shore of the sea of Galilee (with Tiberias as the most important city, followed by Tarichaeae).

One of the arguments of my theory is that a flight can be discerned in Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem. As the Gospel of Luke is the most suggestive one for this flight theme (in its extensive ‘travel narrative’ middle part), I included several passages of the ‘travel narrative’ in my argument. One of these passages is chapter 9 verse 58 ‘Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man has nowhere to lay his head’, which I interpreted as the complaint of a refugee.

Recently I reread Luke, and the fragment that contains the verse above – chapter 9 verse 51-62 – stood out, so I decided to elaborate it further in the light of my theory. I am of the opinion that every sentence and phrase of this passage relates to the Jewish rebellion against the Romans and the flight of the defeated Galileans to Jerusalem. Before quoting and discussing this fragment, I will briefly mention two relevant and chronologically preceding sentences (one from Josephus’s War and one from the Gospel of Mark).

The two preceding verses:
• In his Vita and Jewish War Josephus mentions the revolutionary activities of Jesus son of Saphat several times. At the recapture of Tarichaeae by the Romans Josephus mentions Jesus son of Saphat for the last time (War III, 498): ‘Terror-struck by his [Titus’s] audacity, none of the defenders on the ramparts ventured to fight or offer resistance. Abandoning their posts, Jesus [son of Saphat] and his supporters fled across country, while the rest rushed down to the lake.’
• Mark points to the atmosphere of shock and terror which surrounds the start of Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem (Mk 10:32) ‘And they were on the road, going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus was walking ahead of them; and they were in shock, and those who brought up the rear were terrified.’

Lucas 9: 51-62
Here we find Jesus and the group under his command at the northern border of Samaria, the region which in peacetime was crossed by the Galilean Jews on their shortest way to Judea. The Samaritans were well prepared to take care of large groups of Galileans on their way to and from the religious festivals in Jerusalem.

Text
(51) When the days drew near for him to be received up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem. (52) And he sent scouts ahead of him, who went and entered a village of the Samaritans, to make ready for him; (53) but the people would not receive him, because his face was set toward Jerusalem. (54) And when his disciples James and John saw it, they said, “Lord, do you want us to bid fire come down from heaven and consume them?” (55) But he turned and rebuked them. (56) And they went to another village. (57) As they were going along the road, a man said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.” (58) And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man has nowhere to lay his head.” (59) To another he said, “Follow me.” But he said, “Lord, let me first go and bury my father.” (60) But he said to him, “Leave the dead to bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” (61) Another said, “I will follow you, Lord, but let me first say farewell to those at my home.” (62) Jesus said to him, “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”

Discussion
• Messengers.
I have translated the Greek ‘aggeloi’ of verse 52, which is traditionally translated as 'messengers', as ‘scouts’ because the military context becomes clear in verse 54 (with the proposed use of burning arrows).
• The ‘no crossing’ of the Samaritans because Jerusalem was the destination.
Contrary to the normal situation, during the rebellion, with its heavy ethnic tensions, the Samaritans blocked the passage out of ethnic hatred and because they didn’t want to offend their Roman friends by making obliging gestures towards the latter’s enemies, the rebellious Jews. Therefore it is significant that the crossing is refused because the Galileans had chosen Jerusalem as their destination. By refusing the passage the Samaritans obstructed the Galileans who wanted to troop together in Judea/Jerusalem.
• Repraisals
The Galileans are at least armed with arrow and bow, because fire coming down from heaven means fire coming down from the sky. The captains proposed to set the hostile village on fire.
• A new recruit
In verse 57 somebody joins the group unconditionally.
• Homeless
The holes of the foxes and the nests of the birds: this is a warning to the man or boy who wants to join the forces that he will be homeless, as well as the complaint of Jesus as a refugee.
• There is no way back
This is the subject of the last section of the story (verse 59-62), and it consists of two elements:
o A member of the group wants to go and bury his father first. Maybe a natural death is meant, but considering the circumstances the father might have fallen in the battle against the Romans shortly before. To bury the dead was a weighty duty for every Jew, so the impossibility to perform this duty means that the circumstances were highly exceptional. I am not going to discuss the meaning of ‘leave the dead to bury their own dead’ exhaustively here, but as the Greek word ‘nekros’ means ‘dead’ as well as ‘moribund’ these moribund ones could be the Romans because the rebels hoped to kill them in a following engagement. So this sentence might mean ‘let the Romans bury the dead’ or ‘let the Romans bury their dead’.
o The man who wants to go back to say goodbye gives the same impression. The war circumstances and the chaos at the recapture of Tarichaeae by the Romans have obstructed him from saying goodbye to his family, and he wants to do so yet. But he also is dissuaded from returning and looking back.
• In the last verse preparedness for the kingdom of God means preparedness for rebellion and war. This is revolutionary language.

A translation of Luke 9:51-62 into overt historiography
I believe the following reconstruction comes close to the events of a mid-September day of the year 67 CE on the border of Galilea and Samaria.

• (51) Jerusalem is the destination of the fleeing Galilean rebels and their families.
• (52) Jesus son of Saphat sends scouts to the first (northernmost) Samaritan village to learn if the Samaritans will give the Galilean revolutionary army free passage through their territory.
• (53) The answer is negative: the Samaritans will not let pass the army / the refugees because they are on their way to go and defend Jerusalem.
• (54) Two captains propose to repay the uncooperative Samaritans with destruction of their village by fire from burning arrows.
• (55) With the Roman threat behind them, Jesus considers new hostilities with the Samaritans a bad idea and resolutely rejects the proposal.
• (56) The revolutionary army changes its route to the east (as we know from what follows). The north is excluded because they are expelled there by the Romans, the south is now cut off by the Samaritans, and the western way through the coastland isn’t a realistic option either because this is Samaritan territory as well, and Caesarea, the most important city of that area is extremely hostile because of the high ethnic tension.
• (57) A man or boy joins the army of the rebels.
• (58) Jesus warns him that he will be homeless, and complains that he is homeless himself.
• (59-60) Someone proposes to go and bury his father (who was killed in the fight for Tarichaeae?) Jesus son of Saphat dissuades him to do so; the recruit gets the advice or is commanded to propagate the Zealotic revolution instead.
• (61-62) Somebody else declares to be prepared to serve the revolutionary ideal after he has returned home to say goodbye to his loved ones. He also is advised not to do so: the way back is blocked irrevocably. Jesus son of Saphat ends with the image of the plowman who doesn’t look back. Anyone who lingers in the past (in our case maybe the traumatising recent past of the defeat at Tarichaeae) is not fit for war, which demands great sacrifices.

I am looking forward to your comments, suggestions and alternative interpretations of this passage.

[Secret Alias]

In my book A Chronological Revision of the Origins of Christianity I work out the theory that the central events described in the Gospels took place just before and during the war of the Jews against the Romans (66-70 CE) and that the Jesus of the Gospels was one and the same person as Jesus son of Saphat in Josephus.

Sounds promising.

[FransJVermeiren]

My discussion of Luke 9:51-62 above showed the war events of a mid-September day of the year 67CE at the border between Galilee and Samaria.
Below I will discuss the rest of Luke’s travel narrative, and I connect both contributions with a verse of Josephus’s Jewish War (II, 265): Then, deployed in gangs throughout the country, they looted the houses of the nobles and killed their owners. They set villages on fire, so that all Judaea felt the effect of their frenzy and day by day the fighting blazed more fiercely.
Josephus mentions two favorite Zealot guerilla tactics: the setting on fire of villages and the robbing and killing of rich people. Therefore the proposal of two captains to set the hostile Samaritan village on fire was not an isolated initiative. These captains suggested this particular reprisal because the Zealots usually treated hostile villages like this. Below we will come across the ‘robbing and killing’ tactic.

I believe we can discern three supplementary flight passages in the travel narrative chapters after the events at the Samaritan border. These three fragments shed light on three different aspect of the food problem of the Galilean revolutionary fighters/refugees. A simple household, a rich landowner and a rich Jericho tax collector are confronted with the Galileans’ search for food.
• In chapter 11:5-10 the soldiers are operating during the night, they wake up the father of the family and insolently insist until they get hold of the family’s food supply. The verse ‘Ask, and it will be given you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you’ is of a very earthly brutality. I paraphrase as follows: Bang on the door until it’s opened, claim the food stock, and if the occupant is unwilling ransack the house until you find it.
• Chapter 12:13-21, the ‘Parable of the rich fool’ breathes quite a similar atmosphere as the story above. But now we are not on the doorstep of a Peraean countryman who gets off with a fright. This time we are underway to a big farmhouse, to a gentleman farmer who enjoys the wealth and the luxury that his latifundia yields. ‘Fool, this night your soul is required of you’ says verse 20. How did the Galileans know beforehand that this man was going to die the next night? Because they were going to kill him and loot his cellar and his barns. The next verse draws a rather cynical conclusion: ‘So is he who lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.’ – This is the fate of rich gentile gentleman farmers.
• Chapter 19:1-8, the Zacchaeus story, is a story of intimidation and revolutionary taxation which I have elaborated elsewhere. The Galilean refugees enjoy their stay in Jericho on Zacchaeus’s expense.


Beside these three flight stories, there are several other passages in Luke’s travel chapters that are understood best if they are placed in the time of revolution and war.
• Under its idyllic surface (‘Consider the lilies, how they grow’) chapter 12:22-31 speaks of enduring hunger and poor living circumstances, and of overcoming anxiety in the prospect of God’s kingdom. When the Romans are thrown out all needs will be satisfied.
• Chapter 12:49: ‘I came to cast fire upon the earth; and would that it were already kindled!’ The following verses (12:51-53) discuss the civil war in similar words as the synoptic Apocalypse and Josephus (War IV, 131-132).

• The passage 14:25-33, called ‘The Cost of Discipleship’, is quite illuminating, as it is totally devoted to the rebellion.
o Verse 25 ‘Now great multitudes accompanied him’ shows that Jesus was not traveling to Jerusalem with a small following of disciples, but at the head of thousands of Galilean refugees.
o In my opinion verse 26 and 27 don’t discuss the cost of discipleship but the cost of being a revolutionary soldier: to hate your family and your life, and to bear your cross (with crucifixion as the favorite Roman punishment for insurrectionists).
o Verses 28-30 speaks of building a πυργος, a tower, and the need to complete this task. A πυργος is, “as in Greek writings from Homer down, a tower, a fortified structure rising to a considerable height, to repel a hostile attack or to enable a watchman to see in every direction”. (Thayer’s Greek Lexicon). So these verses also betray the war situation. Compare Josephus, War II, 572-575.
o In verses 31-32 the war is present explicitly: ‘Or what king, going to encounter another king in war, will not sit down first and take counsel whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? And if not, while the other is yet a great way off, he sends an embassy and asks terms of peace.’ This seems to be a little piece of theorizing about the ongoing war. With Roman legions consisting of 5,210 legionnaires, the enemy is depicted quite realistically.

• In chapter 18:29-30 those who have left everything behind for the sake of the revolution will be compensated generously in this life and in the afterlife.
• In his lamentation over Jerusalem Jesus complains that the things that make for peace are hid from the eyes. As in Greek ειρηνη and πολεμος are diametrically opposed military concepts, this lament says that the Jews have chosen for war (19:41-42).
• Luke’s travel narrative ends with a vaticinium ex eventu on the lost war of 66-70 CE (19:43-44): ‘For the days shall come upon you, when your enemies will cast up a bank about you and surround you, and hem you in on every side, and dash you to the ground, you and your children with you, and they will not leave one stone upon another in you; because you did not know the time of your visitation.’ This is not about Pilate’s time nor about the fifties of the first century CE.

Allow me to end with Mark’s arrival in Jerusalem of Jesus and his followers:
• Mark 11:8 gives a solid chronological clue as the people of Jerusalem are in the countryside to collect palm branches for the Sukkot festival. In combination with my other chronological findings the arrival of the Galilean rebels in Jerusalem can be placed at the 15th of Tishri of the Jewish year 3828 (10th of October 67 CE).
• The ‘Hosanna’ in the next verse is part of Psalm 118, a rough war song (‘All nations surrounded me; in the name of the Lord I cut them off!’)